The Market Ticker - iPhone5s Fingerprint Scanner Hacked

The old-fashioned way — with an impression of a fingerprint.

But remember, Apple said that won’t work.  

Wrong.

“First, the fingerprint of the enrolled user is photographed with 2400 dpi resolution. The resulting image is then cleaned up, inverted and laser printed with 1200 dpi onto transparent sheet with a thick toner setting. Finally, pink latex milk or white woodglue is smeared into the pattern created by the toner onto the transparent sheet,” reads the Chaos Computer Club’s post.

“After it cures, the thin latex sheet is lifted from the sheet, breathed on to make it a tiny bit moist and then placed onto the sensor to unlock the phone. This process has been used with minor refinements and variations against the vast majority of fingerprint sensors on the market.”

If the process seems a little unbelievable, the group has also posted a video showing off their exploit in action — just the authentication bit, not the entire picture-taking, mold-making, fake-finger-generating part of it all.

So….

Don’t have a drink in a bar, where you might leave a fingerprint.

Or open a door.

Or anything else.

By the way, this process is as old as are fingerprint scanners, as well as cops trying to match prints left at a scene with a potential suspect when they don’t have probable cause to arrest — and thus have to resort to subterfuge to get a print to match against.

Guess what — it works on the iPhone5s too, even though Apple said that it wouldn’t because the system allegedly looks “beneath” the surface of the skin.

Well, so much for that…